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Pulling a rabbit out of a hat, where do policies come from? An examination of the criminal justice policy processes behind the building of the Dóchas Centre (Ireland’s largest women’s prison).

Carroll, Eoin
(2012)
Pulling a rabbit out of a hat, where do policies come from? An examination of the criminal justice policy processes behind the building of the Dóchas Centre (Ireland’s largest women’s prison).
Masters thesis, Dublin Institute of Technology.

There is an increasing need to understand the processes in which key decisions are made within the criminal justice system. While women in the Irish prison system are still very much in the minority they are the fastest growing population in prison and are currently experiencing overcrowding unknown in living memory in Irish prisons. It is too soon to comprehensively examine the origins of the recent policy decision to retrofit bunk beds and dormitories in Ireland’s largest women’s prison (Dóchas Centre) and what other possible solutions were explored, for example, why a proposed new facility was cancelled. However, it is possible to examine the origins of the Dóchas Centre, which was responding to a crisis of its era.